Barack Obama Steers Clear of Muslims across-the-river in Michigan

Experts say candidate attempting to sidestep controversy, but at his peril

The cover of this week’s New Yorker magazine may explain why Barack Obama isn’t reaching out to Michigan’s Muslims.

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee is shown in the Oval Office, wearing a turban and bumping fists with his wife, Michelle, who is in combat boots with a rifle slung over her shoulder. The cartoon, intended as satire, is a reminder of the dangers of any association with Muslims for Mr. Obama, who has fought false rumours that his middle name, Hussein, indicates he was born into the Islamic faith.

Muslim- and Arab-Americans represent four per cent of the vote in Michigan, a battleground in this year’s US election.

Yet Mr. Obama, who has held 13 events in the state during the presidential campaign, hasn’t visited a mosque or met with Muslim leaders.

Bill Ballenger, editor of the nonpartisan newsletter Inside Michigan Politics, said Mr. Obama, 46, has to strike a delicate balance. The Illinois senator “doesn’t have to pander” to such voters, who are likely to back him anyway, though he can ill-afford to “dismiss them in an arrogant fashion.”

While Mr. Obama is leading in Michigan polls, some politicians said it would be a mistake for him not to actively court the state’s Muslim voters, who went for Democrat John Kerry four years ago and Republican George W. Bush in 2000.

The Democrats “do this at their own peril,” said David Bonior, a former Michigan congressman who is advising Mr. Obama.

Osama Siblani, publisher of The Arab American News in Dearborn, complained that Mr. Obama’s arms-length approach demonstrates that he views Muslims as “a liability.” Many Muslims who once leaned Republican have been turned off by the Iraq war and the law enforcement scrutiny of their community put in place after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Third-party candidate Ralph Nader, who is of Lebanese descent, was on the ballot in Michigan in 2004, and is petitioning to do so again this year. He could hurt Mr. Obama by peeling off 25 per cent of the Arab community’s vote, said Morley Winograd, former chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party.

“You have in Ralph Nader’s candidacy a genuine Arab-American who has a lot of notoriety and publicity,” he said. It “would be detrimental to Obama’s candidacy.”

Muslims in and around Detroit said they have been worried by several recent controversies, particularly a report last month that Obama campaign aides removed two young women wearing Muslim headscarves, called Hijabs, from his camera backdrop. The candidate later called the women to apologize.

Hassan Habhab, a 28-year-old Democrat who works at a Dearborn mall, said he supported Mr. Obama until the incident, though he hadn’t heard about the apology.

“I don’t know if I should vote for somebody like that,” he said.

Some of Mr. Obama’s foreign-policy stances also have raised concern. Last month, he was criticized by Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, after he told the Washington-based American Israel Public Affairs Council, the leading pro-Israel lobbying group, that Jerusalem must remain the undivided capital of Israel.

“As long as he believes this way, I do not believe he is going to get the overwhelming support of our community,” said Osama Siblani, who voted for George W. Bush in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004.
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…this post forwarded by Windsor Humanist, Matt Achine, after a July 16, 2008 article by Heidi Przybyla over The Bloomberg Service

Head of US Homeland Security renews border scare

The head of U.S. homeland security has resurrected the menacing image of terrorists from Canada sneaking into the U.S. to blow up American cities, a scenario he suggests would prompt an immediate border shutdown.

Michael Chertoff ’s comments are a setback for Canadian officials who have repeatedly tried in recent years to dispel the notion that Canada is a “safe haven” for terrorists ready and waiting to exploit a porous northern border to attack the U.S.

As recently as late 2005, some U.S. politicians and commentators were still making the inaccurate claim that some of the 19 hijackers on Sept. 11, 2001, snuck into the U.S. from Canada.

In his strong comments to the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board, Mr. Chertoff appeared aggravated by complaints from border communities that upcoming U.S. requirements for passports or other secure travel documents at land crossings will harm trade, commerce and tourism.

“We want to be able to strengthen our protection at the border,” Mr. Chertoff told the newspaper board Tuesday, referring to the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative.

It will require Canadians and Americans entering the U.S. across land borders to carry a passport or biometrically secure identification by next summer, at the earliest.

“All this seems reasonable, but all I’ve heard in the last six months are complaints about this,” Mr. Chertoff continued, in comments posted on the newspaper’s website Wednesday. “I heard complaints about people from the northern border who say, ‘Well, it’s going to make it less convenient and that’s going to affect our business.’

“I say ‘Well, what do you think is going to happen to your business when a guy comes across the border with a phoney document and blows up a target in Buffalo or in Detroit?’

“Do you think that the American public is going to then allow the border to remain open or are they going to suddenly clamp down?”

The Windsor-Detroit border crossing is Canada’s busiest. The Buffalo-Fort Erie crossing is third.

The U.S. secretary for homeland security also came under sharp criticism Wednesday after saying he had a hunch America would be the target of a major al-Qaida attack this summer. In remarks to the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board, Mr. Chertoff said his assessment was based on past summertime terror plots, increased al-Qaida training activities in south Asia, and a recent spike in public statements by Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden’s second-in-command.

“All of these things have given me a gut feeling that we are in a period of vulnerability,” he said. “Not that I have a specific threat that I have right now but … I want to be somewhat more vigilant.”

President George W. Bush quickly distanced himself from Mr. Chertoff ’s remarks, with spokesman Tony Fratto saying “there continues to be no credible, specific intelligence to suggest that there is an imminent threat to the homeland.”

A spokesman for Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty said the province will leave any request for clarification and official response to Mr. Chertoff ’s remarks to the federal government. Federal Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day could not be reached.

The U.S. domestic security czar also repeated his recent comment that high-security driver’s licences, which Ontario is planning to introduce next year, could be used instead of a passport. A U.S. pilot project in Washington state to test the concept is to start in January.

“We want to get to a position with the land border that we don’t require a passport, but that would require one of maybe half a dozen kinds of secure identification comparable to a passport … a passport, a similar card called the passcard issued by the state department, or driver’s licences that comply, again, with the standards of a passport.” (The state department’s Passport Card would use radio frequency identification technology to link to a U.S. government database containing a traveller’s biographical data and a photograph.)
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…this post forwarded by a Windsor Humanist (Neil.Hod.) after a July 12, 2007 article by Ian MacLeod in The Ottawa Citizen

We’re All Gonna Die! (Part One) – Report Puts City At Risk, Comartin Says

Dirty bomb explosions involving a large amount of radioactive cesium might cause as much as $250 billion damage at the CN Tower, $80 billion at B.C. Place Stadium and $75 billion at the Ambassador Bridge.

The paper calculates possible costs in six areas: explosive cleanup; loss and damage to structures; evacuation; lost productivity; medical treatment; and lost tourism.

The report, which calculates hypothetical economic consequences from “radiological dispersal devices,” concludes that “Canada (as well as other nations) lack the technology necessary to decontaminate a large, densely populated area under the extreme cost and time pressures that an RDD event would generate.”

A spokeswoman for Defence Research and Development Canada (website here) said nobody from her office would comment on the report but that a statement would be released on the defence department website www.forces.gc.ca.

“The analysis they did needs to be done,” said Joe Comartin, vice-chair of the national public safety and national security committee.

“But I think it’s one of those reports where you claim national security and you keep it under wraps.”

Mr. Comartin said the report will needlessly increase anxiety among some citizens.

He also said the analysis indicates that the Ambassador Bridge should not be twinned, since bridges should be far enough away that if one went down, the other would remain standing.

Skip McMahon, director of external affairs for The Canadian Transit Company, the Canadian arm of the Ambassador Bridge, would not discuss specific issues in the report — except to say it indicates why vehicles should be inspected before entering the bridge.

“We don’t comment on any issues dealing with the security that we have in place at the facility other than the fact that we do have 24-hour armed security, seven days a week, 365 days a year,” he said. “As far as the report itself is concerned, it is a what-if scenario.

“It’s one of the reasons that we are such strong supporters of reverse customs inspection.”

Mr. McMahon said after the 9/11 attacks, security was increased on both sides of the bridge, including hiring a Windsor police vehicle which has sat under the span since Sept. 11, 2001.
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…this post forwarded by a Windsor Humanist (Neil.Hod.) after a July 4, 2007 article by Craig Pearson in The Windsor Star

Canada Sows Border Confusion: U.S. Official

False expectations sown about new travel initiative

A senior Homeland Security official on Wednesday accused the Canadian government of sowing confusion about looming passport requirements at the Canada-U.S. land border, even as U.S. officials again admitted they don’t know when the plan will come into full force.

Kathleen Kraninger, director of Homeland Security’s screening co-ordination office, said Ottawa had contributed to public uncertainty about the impending U.S. rules by creating false expectations the Bush administration might scrap the controversial Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI).

“..I’ll just cut through it and say, very honestly, the fact that the Canadian government was very concerned about the impact in the relationship that this would have (and) has been really saying ‘Do we really want to do this? Is the U.S. government really going to do this? Maybe Congress will stop them? Maybe we’ll go back to just the way things have always been.’ That kind of perspective is clearly what exacerbates confusion at the local level..”, Ms. Kraninger told a group of academics and diplomats at a forum organized by the Woodrow Wilson Centre’s Canadian Studies program.

“Clearly that kind of interest and message and confusion is in some peoples’ interest. That’s just something I just would want to lay on the table.”

The swipe drew a tart response from Kevin O’Shea, the political affairs minister at the Canadian Embassy, who said Ottawa has “never opposed” and “never tried, or sought, to cause confusion” about the passport plan.

“Our primary concern has been the implementation of it,” Mr. O’Shea said.

The exchange revealed the depth of bilateral tension that has developed between the U.S. and Canada as the Bush administration rushes to begin implementing the WHTI at land border crossing as early as January 2008.

Canadian officials have long complained, both in private and public settings, that blame for confusion over the plan falls squarely at the Bush administration’s doorstep.

With time running out before the potential enforcement of new travel document rules, the U.S. has yet to reach agreement with Canada on an acceptable “alternative document” to a passport that Canadians can use to cross land borders.

Talks about the possible use of security-enhanced driver’s licences — which denote citizenship and identity — are still in their infancy with only one approved pilot project underway.

While Congress has extended the deadline for implementation until June 2009, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has repeatedly said he will not wait to begin enforcement.

…this post forwarded by a Windsor Humanist (N.Hod) after a May 31, 2007 article by Sheldon Alberts in The National Post

Biometrics at Border ‘Appropriate’

Documents with DNA or Other Biological ID Needed for Security, Study Says

Canadians will inevitably have to carry travel documents with their DNA, biometrics or other biological identifiers in order to ensure secure border travel to the United States, according to a new white paper to be revealed in Ottawa today.

Governments must prepare to make massive investments in new technologies at border crossings if they want to make the most of strict new travel rules for passengers under The Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, says the paper, released to CanWest News Service by The Network on North American Studies in Canada, part of the foundation that administers The Canada-U.S. Fulbright Programme.

“We need to face the fact that there are some difficult challenges and that we need to address those challenges and we need to use whatever tools are most appropriate in a democratic society to make those decisions and to move forward,” said Michael Hawes, who will present the paper as executive director of The Foundation for Educational Exchange between Canada and the United States of America.

Government officials and policy experts from the U. S. Embassy, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and The Canada Border Services Agency will discuss the paper Monday in a panel held in the nation’s capital.

Although some technology, such as DNA- enabled passports or driver’s licences, may be a long way off, terror threats and other looming risks mean governments must begin to seriously consider how they will introduce those measures in the future, Mr. Hawes said.

“As the world becomes more complex, and as our expectations with respect to safety and security become greater, governments are going to have to invest in appropriate ( measures) — whether it’s technologies, additional people, additional infrastructure — in order to make sure that people can move freely,” he said.

The paper examines the issues and challenges involved in beefing up border security and requirements for enhanced travel documents.

Above all, the governments of Canada, the U.S. and Mexico must seriously consider the impact the new rules will have on their respective countries and work to ensure they can be implemented to prevent serious problems, it says.

Earlier this year, new rules came into force that require Canadian air travellers to show a passport before they’re allowed to fly into the U.S.

Canadians will also have to show passports at land-crossings — a rule that is expected to come into force sooner rather than later.

The original deadline was set for January 2007, but officials in both countries have been pushing for an extension.

Despite this, U. S. Ambassador to Canada David Wilkins recently urged Canadians to get their passports to deal with the new rules, which he says will take effect sometime next year.

But stricter rules that require travellers to show passports are just one step in the movement toward more secure borders, according to the report. In order to adequately confirm an individual’s identity and speed up the process of screening passengers, governments will inevitably move to enhanced identity documents that use biological information to identify travellers, it says.

“It is likely that there will be some form of biometrically enabled identifier or credential that individuals will carry,” said Gayle Nix, executive director with Accenture, a global management consulting firm who will moderate the panel discussion.

Mr. Hawes said the paper clearly directs governments to think about developing partnerships with the private sector to help implement new technologies at border crossings.

That’s necessary in order to properly take advantage of technological possibilities, such as embedding radio frequency identification chips, electronic fingerprints or even DNA into travel documents, the report says.

However, the report acknowledges that moving in this direction and linking an individual’s biological information on travel documents to a government database will likely stir a major controversy about privacy rights and protecting personal information.

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…this post forwarded by a Windsor Humanist (N.Hod) after a May 28, 2007 article by Carly Weeks in The Ottawa Citizen

Terror-phobia Hurts Us More Than The Terrorists

The threat of homeland terrorism has been exaggerated to the point where we are our own worst enemy, say a small but growing number of experts and commentators.

More than five years after the events of Sept. 11, 2001, the attacks have proven to be a statistical, albeit horrible, anomaly. The other shoe never dropped. Foreign terrorists have been thoroughly ineffective at mounting another attack against North America.

Perhaps, they suggest, al-Qaida is not a formidable threat, much less an existential one. An overwrought public imagination, fuelled by alarmist politicians, Hollywood script writers, a blood-lusting news media and others in the “terrorism industry,” has, they say, created an irrational response far more damaging and dangerous to our way of life than terrorism itself.

Criticism about perceived overreactions to the threat of homeland terrorism is not new. But as North Americans move farther in time from the events of 9-11, those voices of dissent are rising.

The U.S. government’s loudly trumpeted “War on Terror” is not the solution to the problem, writes University of Pennsylvania political scientist Ian S. Lustick in his recent book, “Trapped in the War on Terror”.

“It has become the problem. The immense costs, the self-inflicted wounds we suffer from it, and its permanently perceived inadequacy in comparison with the threats it forces us to imagine are more destructive of our national life than the damage terrorists are likely to inflict.”

Another contentious new book making the rounds is “Overblown: How Politicians and the Terrorism Industry Inflate National Security Threats, and Why We Believe Them”.

“A threat that is real but likely to prove to be of limited scope has been massively, perhaps even fancifully, inflated to produce widespread and unjustified anxiety,” wasteful government spending, witch-hunts and an increasingly unpopular war in Iraq, writes author John Mueller.

Celebrated journalist and terrorism expert James Fallows, in a recent Atlantic Monthly, warns the U.S. will likely be attacked again.

Even so, “because of al-Qaida’s own mistakes, and because of the things the United States and its allies have done right, al-Qaida’s ability to inflict direct damage in America or on Americans has been sharply reduced.”

Wesley Wark, one of Canada’s leading experts in terrorism and security intelligence, bristles at the thesis laid out by Mueller and others.

There is, says the University of Toronto political scientist in an interview, some legitimacy in dismissing terrorism as an existential threat based on what hasn’t happened since 9-11.

But, “if you’re going to say the threat from terrorism is overblown, you have to accompany that argument with some argument that would say terrorists will never get their hands on (weapons of mass destruction) and will never use them. And I’ve not seen a strong argument to that effect. It runs counter to all we know.

“There’s nothing that we’ve learned about al-Qaida since 9/11 that suggests that capability or will has gone away. Everything points to the prospect that there will be future attempts. You can only buy into the (overblown) argument if somehow you go with the recent past, if somehow you believe the 9/11 attacks were an anomaly or an unrepeatable event.

And I don’t know of anything that plausibly argues that’s the case.”

…this post forwarded by a Windsor Humanist (N.Hod) after a May 19, 2007 article by Ian MacLeod in The Ottawa Citizen